Maybe I’m Just Overreacting January 28, 2007

Heat surfaces in the form of some berbere oil, an accent that enlivens the eating and trumpets the chef’s origins. (Ouattara was born in Ivory Coast; the base of the oil relies on the Ethiopian spice blend made with red pepper, fenugreek, cardamom and more.)

I’m astonished that these sentences — back to back! — got through an editor. A quick glance at a map shows that Cote d’Ivoire and Ethiopia are at the very least 3000 miles apart. Basic research confirms my gut instinct that Ivorian cuisine and Ethiopian cuisine don’t have much in common. But somehow using berbere is an homage to an Ivorian chef’s roots. I guess that doesn’t matter. It’s just Africa, after all..

Sigh. Its just a food review, not the A section. And odds are that the Chef himself probably doesn’t care — as has been pointed out to me, the restaurant itself claims to serve “African” cuisine. So I’ll let my exclamation of “Why is this considered to be okay?” fade into the background, while others argue seemingly endlessly about where specifically in Italy a certain shape of pasta came from.